Adjusting
by MusicWritesMyLife
Summary: "You didn't make me come all the way to L.A. to get your dry-cleaning just so you could go out and play the hero, did you?" Tony and Pepper begin the transition from a professional relationship to a romantic one, but some habits are hard to break. One shot. Post IM2


**A/N: My first stab into the realm of IM fics. Reviews are very well loved!**

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When Pepper Potts' phone goes off, she's already irritated. Not only has she been relegated once again to picking up Tony's dry-cleaning—something she thought she was well past at this point—when there are a million and one other things that she can be doing with her time, but there are still five people ahead of her in the line-up. It's like all the high-flying lawyers and business people in L.A. decided to go and pick up their dry-cleaning on the same lunch break.

Too frustrated to bother digging through the disaster that is the inside of her purse—despite her fabled neatness, her purse is the one thing Pepper has never been able to keep clean—Pepper presses her index finger against the Bluetooth strapped to her ear. She hates using this thing; it makes her feel like some big CEO—which she is—and it makes her ear burn after extended periods of time. The only reason she has it in is because she knew when she left the house this morning that her BlackBerry was lost somewhere in the depth of her purse, and she was certain that she would get at least one phone call—but realistically more like ten—during the time it would take her to get the dry-cleaning. Surprisingly, this is the first one she's received all morning. Stark Industries seems to be handling itself for once.

"Virginia Potts." Without the benefit of caller ID that her BlackBerry provides, Pepper has to assume a professional greeting.

"Still picking up my dry-cleaning? I would have thought you'd be back by now."

Pepper sighs at the sound of Tony's teasing tone on the other end of the line. He's mocking her—one of his favourite pastimes—and normally, she brushes it off, or even occasionally plays along, but it's much harder to do after you've been standing in line for the better part of an hour waiting to pick up dry-cleaning that isn't even yours. He thinks it's all very funny to call and poke fun about the status of his dry-cleaning or Pepper's ability to handle such a simple task, but the humour is somewhat lost when you're the one who's been waiting in line in the heat. The beads of sweat that have been steadily trickling down her back have successfully coagulated the back of her blouse against her skin, making her begin to wish she hadn't decided to leave her blazer at home because the damp line beginning to form on the back of her blouse is rather embarrassing.

"Remind me again why you couldn't look after your_ own_ dry-cleaning?" Pepper says, trying to keep a lid on her frustration. As tempting as letting it all out on Tony is, she's almost positive it won't help the situation.

"Because I had a very important appointment this morning," Tony replies. She can tell from his tone of voice that he's grinning, a clear sign that—as usual—he's enjoying this entirely too much.

Even though Tony is on the other end of the phone line and not right in front of her, Pepper raises her eyebrows disbelievingly. "_You_ had a very important appointment? The only 'important' appointments you have are with your workshop or with that stupid suit. I'm the one that has to handle all of the meetings that are _actually _important." She freezes as the reality of what she has just said dawns on her. "You didn't make me come all the way to L.A. to get your dry-cleaning just so you could go out and play the hero, did you?"

"Contrary to popular belief Miss Potts, there_ are_ business appointments that do occasionally require my presence. In fact, one of said appointments occurred this morning, therefore requiring you to go 'all the way to L.A.'—which, for the record, isn't actually that far and you weren't even the one driving; how do you think Happy felt about having to drive 'all the way to L.A.' and then 'all the way back to Malibu'?—to pick up my dry-cleaning because I was obviously incapable—"

"Tony." Pepper doesn't have time to listen to him talk himself around in circles about the technicalities of her little stint to pick up his clothes when it's so obvious that he's avoiding the question. "You didn't answer the question: did you make me go get your dry-cleaning so that you could go out in the Iron Man suit?"

There's a pause on the other end of the line, as Tony weighs the question. "No," he finally replies. "I wasn't out in the suit."

Pepper breathes a sigh of relief. The worry that rises up every time she thinks about Tony going out in that suit disappears again, as does the momentary fury that he would make her take time out of her very busy day to go and pick up his clothes so that he could run off and save the world. "Good. But why me, Tony? I'm not your PA anymore. I've got lots of other things to do that take precedence over your dry-cleaning. Couldn't you have sent Happy to get it? He would have had to drive me into L.A. for work anyways."

"Well, for someone who's no longer a PA, you sure don't seem to be adjusting to the role change very well." She can picture Tony's smirk. "Besides, Happy was otherwise engaged this morning."

"Driving you to your 'appointment'?" Pepper says drily. "You know, it's not illegal for you to drive yourself places. In fact, it's highly encouraged."

"Funny you should say that, seeing as you are fully able to drive a car and yet I distinctly recall Happy driving _you_ to the dry-cleaner's this morning," Tony replies with mock seriousness.

Pepper sighs. There is truth to Tony's jibe; she could have easily driven herself this morning, and had seriously considered it, only to be deterred by the thought of having to find parking downtown at lunch hour. "Point taken. How did the appointment go?" she asks, trying to change the subject. It's all too easy to slip back into that old chastising, unfailingly professional role that she's been playing for all these years, and she keeps forgetting that she now sort of occupies the role of girlfriend instead—they haven't really actually talked about taking their relationship to that next level yet, but after New York, she's pretty sure it's an inevitability—and should therefore be a little bit more supportive and interested in what Tony does with his time. She's also just not in the mood to bicker with him anymore.

"Fine." There's something closed about his tone that indicates to Pepper that whatever it was didn't go exactly the way Tony had hoped it would. "You still haven't got the dry-cleaning yet?"

"No." The fact that Tony doesn't want to talk about what happened at all is a little concerning. Normally, even if appointments don't go well, he never has a shortage of things to say about them, though none of them are usually positive. "I'm pretty sure every businessman in the city has decided to pick up their clothes right now."

"Well, I don't really need those clothes. So if it's really that bad, why don't you just call it a day? Happy will come and get you."

Pepper is secretly glad that Tony isn't here with her because if he were, she'd be very inclined to strangle him. He made her cancel all her morning meetings and sent her all the way into L.A. to pick up dry-cleaning that he didn't even need? Does he not know that you can't do things like that, that, while she is possibly his girlfriend, he can't just expect her to drop everything and go pick up his clean clothes, especially if they're clean clothes that he doesn't even need right away? She has a life, too, and, more importantly, a huge international company to run. "I'm fine," she replies tersely. "I'm almost at the counter anyways. You can tell Happy I'll be ready in ten minutes or so."

"Are you sure? Because I can always get it some other time."

"Tony," Pepper says patiently. "I've been standing here for an hour waiting to pick up the damn clothes. I'm not going to leave now."

"Well, you could, I mean, you'd be home so much faster if you did and then we would have so much time to take advantage of the fact that you have the day off because I was thinking we could—"

She can't help but shake her head. He's completely and utterly missing the point, and he doesn't even see it. The point isn't that he doesn't need those clothes or that Pepper would save so much more time by leaving now, or even that because she's been standing in line so long it's much more worth her while to just wait the extra ten minutes to get the damn dry-cleaning—though that is a big factor—the real point is that she's not his PA anymore. He can't just tell her to drop everything and go pick up his dry-cleaning, and he doesn't seem to understand this.

"You know I'm not your PA anymore, right?" she asks again, cutting him off mid-stream. "You can't just send me to pick up the dry-cleaning that you don't actually need. Do you know how many meetings I had to cancel to do this for you?"

The truth is, Pepper didn't actually have to cancel any meetings to go and get the dry-cleaning. Today is one of those days mercifully free of long and tedious meeting with the Board and company reps, and Pepper was planning to enjoy it by waking up late and then heading into the office long enough to pick up some paper work and the few forms that Tony still actually needed to sign—something he complains bitterly about even though Pepper has to sign three times as many in the run of a day—before heading back to the Stark Mansion. Tony doesn't know this, though, and she has not intention of letting him get off scot-free. A healthy dose of guilt has never hurt anyone, especially when you're trying to teach an important lesson.

"Well, you still went, didn't you?" Tony quips. "I mean you could have said, 'Look, Tony, I've got four meetings this morning that I really need to go to'—even though you don't actually need to go to any of them; God knows I never did—'and I really can't pick up your dry-cleaning', and I would have said, 'Okay, Pepper, I'll send Happy to get it sometime' and then you wouldn't have had to cancel _any_ meetings—though I'm not too sure why you're upset about that, those meetings are always _so _boring—and you and I wouldn't be having this conversation."

"You told me it was important!" Pepper cries. "You told me you needed the clothes right away, and I, not wanting to fight with you at nine in the morning, went to get them for you! If I'd known you didn't need them that badly, I wouldn't have gone at all!"

There's a significant pause on the other end of the line before Tony resumes. "Did I really tell you it was important? Because I seem to recall we were talking about why I was asking you to go get the dry-cleaning instead of doing it myself and I was telling you it was because I had a very important appointment and not that the picking up of the clothes was very important. Besides, I wasn't asking you to do it because I thought you're still my PA, I was asking you to do me a favour because you were going into L.A. anyways. Isn't that what you're always telling me to do: kill two birds with one stone?"

God, he's infuriating, especially when he's right. Well, partially right. Had she told him this morning that she was busy he would have let her off the hook, albeit not without a fight. The problem with that was that Pepper didn't actually have any meetings to attend, a point which she was sure was going to come up had the argument—or heated debate as Tony likes to call it—continued and then her argument would have crumbled under his 'your going there anyway to get that paperwork, can't you swing by the dry-cleaner's on the way back?' Trying to point out to him that the point of this whole debate wasn't her resistance to picking up the dry-cleaning, but rather the fact that this was no longer her job and that it was really about time that he started doing more for himself—things that don't involve Iron Man, that was, though Pepper isn't entirely convinced that isn't for his own benefit either—wasn't going to get her anywhere, so she just resigned herself to the fact that she was going to have to go pick it up.

"You wouldn't have let it go that easily," Pepper replies drily, unable to let him live with the delusion that he would be so accommodating, especially given his past history of being exactly the opposite.

"Your lack of faith in me is shocking." Tony feigns hurt, but she can see he's teasing; any tension on his part forgotten. One of the great things and yet also infuriating things about Tony: he can never stay angry with anyone for long, his mind simply moves on to other things. In fact, come tomorrow, he probably won't even remember this.

"Lack of faith? How about past experience?" she retorts teasingly._ Two can play this game, Mr Stark_. "Face it, Tony, you're not the most accommodating of individuals."

"Well, I'm trying!" comes the indignant protest from the other end of the line. "I'm new at this, you know!"

Pepper chuckles. Oh, she knows. Despite his genius IQ, Tony Stark is completely and utterly out of his league when it comes to relationships. He may know how to talk a woman to bed—years of "taking out the trash" has taught her as much—but one-night stands with the Maxim cover models don't rack up any experience in the relationship department.

She does appreciate that he's trying. It's been two weeks since their kiss on the rooftop, and, though they officially talked about their relationship—Pepper's been busy doing damage control after the disaster at the Stark Expo and Tony's been here in L.A. doing God-only-knows what—she has noticed the little things that he's been doing for her, like bringing her coffee in the morning, and not making her do every single little thing for him.

The Bluetooth is beginning to burn Pepper's ear. Absentmindedly, she reaches up to rub it, noticing as she does that there is only one person still ahead of her in line. A glance at her watch tells her that she and Tony have been debating the issue of the dry-cleaning for sixteen minutes, which, with an ordinary person, is ridiculous, but with Tony is slightly surprising. Anything and everything can be—and is—debatable with Tony, and the debates can go on forever. It makes Pepper thankful every day that she decided to join the debate team in freshman year of high school. Most other people would find themselves hopelessly out-witted after a few minutes of debating with the likes of Tony Stark, but Pepper can hold her own quite well.

The man in front of her collects his dry-cleaning and leaves, finally allowing her to approach the counter and—with a slightly strained smile to the woman behind it—hand over the crumpled slip of paper Tony handed her before she left.

"Pepper? You still there?"

Pepper wants to smack herself; she completely forgot that Tony was still on the line. "Yeah. Look, I'm going to have to let you go, okay? Your clothes are ready."

"Oh. Okay. See you later?"

Pepper contemplates this. As annoying as he is, it would be nice to be able to enjoy a relaxing afternoon with him and she has a hunch that there's much more to this " very important business appointment" he had this morning than he's letting on. "Sure," she says finally. "I have to come over and drop those clothes off anyways, don't I?"

"Right." And with that, the call disconnects.

Pepper shakes her head. How like Tony to hang up without saying good-bye. She presses her fingers against the Bluetooth briefly, disconnecting the call from her end, and then, after a moments consideration, removes the device entirely and shoves it into her purse. Her ear is still burning from where the earpiece has been sitting this whole time. That, and her frustration with Tony make it difficult to concentrate on much of anything. She manages a polite smile to the lady behind the counter, who passes over Tony's freshly laundered suits—three of them: all Armani, all tailored, and all dark—with a warm, "Here you are miss," and swings the bag over her shoulder. She feels a tiny pang of sympathy for the six people still in line behind her, but it is short lived as she makes her way towards the doors, craving the crisp, air-conditioned cool of the Bentley.

Happy is pulled up right in front of the dry-cleaners, exactly where Pepper expects him to be, waiting outside to open the door for her. It may be part of his job, but Pepper pretends it isn't; after years of dealing with Tony, she likes to have an opportunity to imagine that chivalry isn't dead.

Happy's smile is a rare, welcome sight. "You get everything, Miss Potts?"

Her responding smile is thin. "Barely, Happy. Just barely."

He chuckles, and looks as if he might say something else, but if he does, it's lost on Pepper as the rush of icy, air-conditioned air of the Bentley's interior envelops her. She barely bites back the contented sigh that escapes her lips as she folds herself—and Tony's clothes—into the backseat, and is immediately glad that she did when she sees Tony himself sitting on the other side, wolfish grin plastered on his face.

"What are you doing here?" Pepper wishes that she could think of something much more witty to say, but she's caught completely off-guard by his presence. "I thought you'd be at home."

"I was, but when it became apparent that you were still in the city I thought I'd surprise you." Tony shrugs, as if his coming all the way back into L.A. again was no big deal. "Happy was making the trip anyways."

Pepper sighs. She'd been hoping for some peace on the way home. "So how was the meeting? You seemed a little hesitant on the phone." If she's going to sit here with Tony, she may as well make it worthwhile. He obviously doesn't want to talk about it, and with anyone else, she would let them make the first move, but she knows that if she says nothing, Tony won't talk at all, and he doesn't do well at keeping things bottled up inside. Pepper would rather ask him about it outright and face evasions and stony silences than have to face some ungodly destruction in the workshop, or him running off on some near-suicide mission in the suit to let go of his anger.

"Fine." The closed-off response comes immediately. Tony refuses to look at her, choosing to stare resolutely out the window instead. Pepper knows this is all a ruse: Tony has never been interested in anything outside his car windows, unless it's a billboard featuring a stunningly attractive woman, who, naturally, he will want to have—or at least a similar one.

"Really?" She says nothing more, fishing around in her purse with the hopes of retrieving the temporarily misplaced BlackBerry. She knows that Tony knows she doesn't buy it at all—her tone said as much—but the ball is in his court now. She's not going to force him to talk to her, yet.

"They don't want me."

The words are quiet, mumbled so that they are barely comprehensible. Pepper has no idea who or what he is talking about—she's not really paying attention either; the search for the BlackBerry is consuming most of her attention—but she can tell from the tone that it is a reluctant admission of what went wrong at this "business meeting"—which she's still not sure is even true; her definition of business meeting is more concurrent with Tony's idea of boredom. "Want you for what?"

"The Avengers initiative," Tony says sullenly. "According to Agent Romanoff's assessment, Iron Man is perfectly suited for the project, but I'm not."

_So that's what the business meeting was about._ She's heard about the Avengers initiative project—Tony mentioned it to her once, briefly—and she knows that Iron Man was being considered for the project. She won't admit it—especially given how disappointed Tony is at having not been chosen, though he'll never admit it—but she is secretly in agreement with Natalie—or Agent Romanoff as she's called now—on her assessment of Tony's usefulness to the Avengers initiative. From what she's heard about the project, it's not the kind of thing that he's ready for right now.

Still, she can't help feeling bad. It's obvious that this is something he really wanted in on, not to mention that the fact they want Iron Man and not him is a huge blow to his ego. Part of her hopes that this will serve as an inspiration for him to improve his behaviour, but the larger part of her knows that he'll sulk for a few days about it and then brush it away. His interest in the Avengers initiative will be gone by the end of next week.

"I'm sorry," she says quietly, resting one hand on his knee. The gesture is simple and not overly familiar, but to Tony, it's more comforting than anything big. Theirs is not a relationship that needs over the top romance or constant displays of affection, something for which she's glad. It's made the transition much easier.

Tony turns his attention away from the window and fixes her with a look of surprise. Her answer obviously isn't one he's been expecting.

"What?" Pepper can't help feeling like she's a zoo animal on display here. The way Tony is staring at her is disconcerting.

He shakes his head. "I just thought you'd be in agreement with Agent Romanoff on this one."

Pepper sighs. She _is_ in agreement with Natasha, but she's also aware that Tony is upset by the decision that has been made and knows she's probably the only one who can make him feel better. "Just because I agree with her doesn't mean I want you to get hurt in the process."

There's a brief moment of silence as Tony digests this information and Pepper resumes the search for her BlackBerry. It seems that he doesn't really have any idea what to say in response; further proof of his romantic inexperience—as if she needs any. She's known all along that if they were to do this it wasn't going to be easy for either party, but she's willing to work through some rough patches to see if this can go anywhere. Her love has gone unrequited for too long for her to want to turn back now. Besides, she's never been the type of girl to run when the going gets tough.

The missing BlackBerry presents itself in the side pouch of her bag—the one part that is actually clean and the last place she would think to look—and she whips it out and immediately begins checking her email. Just because she has no important meetings for the day and hasn't received any phone calls other than the one from Tony doesn't mean that a catastrophe won't occur. Not to mention that since she's still dealing with the aftermath of the catastrophe at the Stark Expo there are probably at least a hundred unread emails from various people/organisations that she'll need to read sometime before going in to the office tomorrow. As she briefly scans yet another useless email forwarded to her by her new PA, Melanie, from some news mogul wanting more info on exactly what happened at the Expo, something dawns on her. "They're still going to want your services occasionally, though, aren't they? Even if they don't officially want you for the project?"

Tony chuckles quietly. "If I didn't know better, Miss Potts, I'd say you were psychic."

Pepper just grins, glad that the black cloud hovering over him seems to have lessened. "I'm a woman of many talents, Mr Stark."

His trademark, rakish grin spreads slowly across his face. "Oh, I know." His eyes sparkle with a wicked light, and Pepper has to look away in an attempt to squash the urge to jump him right then and there.

"So SHIELD _does_ occasionally want you to do work for them," she says, hoping to get Tony's mind back on the task at hand.

He nods. "They say I'm a _consultant_." His tone is bitter; consulting is obviously not an idea that appeals to him.

"Well, it's better than nothing," she replies practically. One of the possible pros of Tony being a part of the Avenger's initiative was that he'd be spending less time running around playing the hero—which in Pepper's opinion is nothing short of suicide. She knows the SHIELD missions wouldn't be completely safe—nothing is in that line of work—but at least there would be structure and—more importantly—other people to put their necks on the line instead of Tony. "Besides, if the consulting goes really well, maybe they'll re-evaluate."

"I don't want to work for them," Tony replies petulantly.

Pepper raises her eyebrows. It's so like him to pretend that he was never actually interested in the project now that he's been cast aside. Tony doesn't like his failures to be publicly broadcasted. "That wasn't the impression I got when you first mentioned it to me."

"I've had my eyes opened," he replies smartly. "I'm better off without them. Besides, it's not like the project was going to go anywhere. Did you see the people on their list?—Well you didn't obviously because you weren't there," he says quickly, catching the look on her face, "but that's not really the point.—Banner's a great guy and all that, but his whole green rage monster thing is a total liability—which is another thing I don't get: why him and not me? It's not like he can be controlled, and he's way more dangerous than me on any given day—and everyone knows Captain America is basically useless; I mean the guy's been frozen for the last seventy years and doesn't seem to have any desire to reintegrate into society. Not exactly a dream team by anyone's standards."

Pepper resists the urge to roll her eyes. This is classic Tony: they don't want him, so he's going to act as if he hasn't been yammering non-stop about this whole project since they got back from New York. "I'm sure that SHIELD wouldn't have selected them unless they were valid candidates. They're not going to pick people for a superhero team that are going to cause more harm than good. That's counterproductive, and it wastes a hell of a lot of money."

"Yeah, well their sanity is a little bit questionable. I mean look at Natashalie. She's like a triple-agent. She's probably developed some kind of multiple-personality disorder and she's Fury's right-hand man. Woman," Tony quips, craning his neck slightly to try and read Pepper's e-mails over her shoulder, a sure sign that he's either unable to find something to occupy himself with, or he's trying to piss her off. Either way, he's on the verge of accomplishing the latter; she likes people reading things over her shoulder as much as Tony likes things handed to him.

"I really wish you wouldn't call her that," she says calmly, casually tilting her BlackBerry so that he can't see the screen. "She has a name."

"She has several, actually. Natalie. Natasha. I'm never sure which one she's going by, and I figure it's better to play it safe. Wouldn't want her getting all offended and killing me. You know how women tend to overreact." He chuckles at his own joke. Pepper, on the other hand, is not amused. Natasha Romanoff is not the only one capable of killing Tony. Even with the Iron Man suit, he's not invincible.

"Besides, you know how bad I am with names," he continues hastily, seeing the less-than-impressed look on her face and realizing that he has hit a nerve. "I need something unique that I'll be able to remember."

"I think you're just trying to be an ass," Pepper replies glibly, not looking up from her phone.

Tony grins, seemingly delighted to be caught in the act. "And tell me, Miss Potts, how am I doing with that?"

She sighs, shoving her phone into the bottom of her purse. Despite the flirtatious banter, she hasn't forgotten the _real_ point of this conversation, nor has she had her full say. "I just don't think you should throw this all out the window. You never, know, the consulting thing might be good for you."

Tony frowns. "I thought you said you agreed with Natashalie."

"About you being a part of the Avengers initiative, yes. But I do think that consulting could be beneficial." At least then he won't simply be dashing out to save the world on a whim.

"Well, I'll think about it," he says reluctantly.

Incredibly pleased at his willingness to make an effort for her sake and having gone without affection for entirely too long, Pepper leans over and presses a kiss on Tony's cheek. "Thank you," she whispers, his stubble rough underneath her lips. She considers going further, but stops herself, aware that they're not alone.

Tony looks thoroughly disappointed as she pulls away. "Hey, you know what we need? We need a holiday," he murmurs, hand ghosting up the inside of her thigh. "You know, get away from all this stress and stuff. Recharge. Have some time for just us. I hear that Fiji is really great..."

Pepper rolls her eyes, gently dislodging his hand. Some things will never change.


End file.
